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Abstract
In this article, I propose to evaluate possible points of contact and divergence between the work of cultural historian Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) and the art historian Aby Warburg (1866-1929). Starting with the Huizinga's review on TheComplete Works of Aby Warburg in 1933, I intend to analyze the particular way these historians undertook the task of following the footsteps of cultural historian Jacob Burckhardt, as well as the challenges underlying this project. Although they admired the work of the Swiss historian, both of them claimed that Cultural History needed to “going beyond” Burckhardt. The way in which Warburg and Huizinga followed this path suggests, however, a different understanding of what it meant to inherit the Burckhardtian tradition, especially concerning the crucial problem of the relationship between art and culture, form and function, and time and history. Finally, I will draw a comparison between the work of Warburg and Huizinga focusing on their morphological approach to the study of cultural forms, as well as the limits and possibilities of historical synthesis in their researches in the field of Cultural and Art History.
